One Starter, One Sub: X-Factors For Today's West Games

Russdemption, the Dunngeon, and, yes, Naz Reid.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, we are here. Enough Play-In nonsense, the playoffs are here. We are about to be blessed with full-effort basketball, something that we too often fail to see in the regular season. This is the NBA, y’all.

Since I talked about some key Eastern Conference matchups last week, I think it would be best to talk about today’s two Western Conference matchups — that is, the Lakers/Wolves and Clippers/Nuggets games. To make it a bit more fun, I want to take a look at one starter and one bench player for each team, because it feels too obvious to point to only the starters and say, “Yeah, that’s the only guy that matters here.”

Let’s just get right into the action, shall we? It’s time to head over to the Mile High City for a second…